Appropriated, chewed up, mulled over, digested, contemplated, and contorted - gathering up along the way fashion, ecology, politics, and art - architectural concepts become veritable things unto themselves in the present tense. As astoundingly diverse as contemporary architecture is, most importantly it is a reflection of what's happening right now all over the world, in people's minds and in the global collective consciousness. The many faces of world architecture today make for a mind-expanding book. Here you'll find the most recent work of over 60 architects and firms, including familiar names such as O. Gehry, Meier, Ando, Foster, and Starck, as well as a host of newcomers sure to be the architecture-celebrities of future generations. Highlights include Jakob & MacFarlane's morphological Restaurant at the Centre Georges Pompidou, Diller & Scofidio's "Blur Building" proposal for the International Expo 2001 in Switzerland (an ovular structure suspended over a lake, encapsulated by a fine mist of water, creating the look of a cloud hovering over the lake), and Herzog & de Meuron's remarkable Tate Modern. Proving that contemporary architecture is not limited to physical building design, New York firm Asymptote's Guggenheim Virtual Museum is also included, a place where visitors can take a cyber-stroll through rooms that are designed to be "compelling spatial environments." Presented alphabetically by architect or firm, Architecture Now! can be used like a reference guide, with extensive photographs and illustrations, biographical and contact information for designers, and a careful selection of today's most influential architects.

    One of the most celebrated living architects, Ando is best known for crafting serenely austere structures that fuse Japanese building traditions with Western modernism. His minimalist masterworks-geometric forms clad in silky-smooth exposed concrete-are suffused with natural light and set in perfect harmony with the landscape. In these highlights from lectures delivered at the University of Tokyo's Graduate School of Architecture, Ando candidly describes his experiences as a largely self-taught practitioner, tracing his development from an early interest in the traditional building craft of his native Japan through his political awakening in the turbulent 1960s to his current stature as one of the world's foremost architects. In addition to exploring his aesthetic influences and working process, Ando offers students a road map not only for maintaining professional integrity, but also for becoming effective agents of change in the world.

    Holl reveals his working methods in this book, part treatise, part manifesto, and part, as Holl writes, "liner notes" to fifteen of his projects. Parallax traces Holl's ideas on topics as diverse as the "chemistry of matter" and the "pressure of light," and shows how they emerge in his architectural work: "criss-crossing" at the Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art in Helsinki, "duration" in the Palazzo del Cinema in Venice, "correlational programming" in the Makuhari housing in Japan. The result is a book that provides a personal tour of the work of one of the world's most esteemed architects. Parallax is designed by Michael Rock of the award-winning design firm 2x4.

    The architect Rem Koolhaas itemized in delirious detail how our cities are being overwhelmed. His celebrated jeremiad is updated here and twinned with Running Room, a fresh response from the cultural critic Hal Foster. Junkspace describes the bleak and featureless world of capitalism, while Running Room seeks to find a space within the junk in which the individual might still exist.

    Kahn, whose many buildings include the Salk Institute, the Yale Study Center, and the Exeter Library. He is remembered, however, not only as a master builder, but also as one of the most important and creative thinkers of the twentieth century. For Kahn, the study of architecture was the study of human beings, their highest aspirations and most profound truths. He searched for forms and materials to express the subtlety and grandeur of life. In his buildings we see the realization of his vision: luminous surfaces that evoke a fundamental awe, silent courtyards that speak of the expansiveness and the sanctity of the spirit, monumental columns and graceful arches that embody dignity and strength. Updated with a new preface, this classic work is a major statement on human creativity, showing us Louis Kahn as architect, visionary, and poet.

    He recruits the beautiful, resourceful Evie, but they slowly get in over their heads as they begin to suspect the proprietor of a highly prominent, far-right website. The man, already one of the most influential in Washington D.C., is about to become all-powerful: he’s just been given incriminating dirt on the President of the United States. Frankie and Evie now find themselves in a cat and mouse battle with the future of the country at stake.

    

    His distinctive brand of architecture, usually moulded around local building traditions (especially those of Kerela, his adopted home state in south India), is instantly identifiable and has, unsurprisingly, revolutionized traditional concepts of architecture in India. Baker's architecture is responsive, uses local materials and lays stress on low-cost design.This biograpy of Laurie Baker, like his work, is direct, simple and comprehensive; further embellished with sketches, plans, photographs and some of Baker's own writings, the book offers the professional architect view of the life, methods and thoughts of an unorthodox genius.

    Heatherwick is known as one of the greatest innovators of our era, and for the first time, this publication provides an inside look at the creation and development of his projects. It answers the one question always asked of Heatherwick's work: How did he do that? The book covers the studio's complete output over more than fifteen years—some 170 projects—including designs large and small: zippered bags that can be expanded to five times their size, a bridge that rolls open and closed, the in-progress one-million-square-foot mall in Hong Kong and glass bridge in London.

    Presents 500 houses classified by architect, designer, patron or cultural tribe, this book looks at some of the most astonishing and creative abodes ever to be built.

    Others may think of it as the last architectural treatise, for it provides a discursive container for ideas that would otherwise be lost. Whatever genre it belongs to, SITELESS is a new kind of architecture book that seems to have come out of nowhere. Its author, a young French architect practicing in Tokyo, admits he "didn't do this out of reverence toward architecture, but rather out of a profound boredom with the discipline, as a sort of compulsive reaction." What would happen if architects liberated their minds from the constraints of site, program, and budget? he asks. The result is a book that is saturated with forms, and as free of words as any architecture book the MIT Press has ever published.The 1001 building forms in SITELESS include structural parasites, chain link towers, ball bearing floors, corrugated corners, exponential balconies, radial facades, crawling frames, forensic housing--and other architectural ideas that may require construction techniques not yet developed and a relation to gravity not yet achieved. SITELESS presents an open-ended compendium of visual ideas for the architectural imagination to draw from. The forms, drawn freehand (to avoid software-specific shapes) but from a constant viewing angle, are presented twelve to a page, with no scale, order, or end to the series. After setting down 1001 forms in siteless conditions and embryonic stages, Blanciak takes one of the forms and performs a "scale test," showing what happens when one of these fantastic ideas is subjected to the actual constraints of a site in central Tokyo. The book ends by illustrating the potential of these shapes to morph into actual building proportions.

    In "Caterpillars in Their Usual Hurry", an alcoholic businessman whose girlfriend has walked out on him decides to make more money, only to discover that his future and past can’t coexist. "The Window at the End of the Street" is the story of Anita, a recently widowed woman, whose return to her parents’ home becomes the cause of both her mother’s death and Anita’s incurable attraction to her neighbour. "Nude Man at the Window" is the second-person narrative of an egoist millionaire who is accused of murdering a prostitute after she claims to have fallen in love with him. "Why I Don’t Lock up My Wife Anymore" is about a man who accidentally discovers his wife in bed with a total stranger and decides to do the unthinkable. "Unloved in Nude Town" is about three friends, one of whom falls in love with a stranger named Mona and pays a price he could never have imagined. With its delicate wit and a strong sense of place, "Long Way from Home" is the story of a gigolo who falls in love for the first time. A second-person narrative, "All You Need Is One Good Shot", is the story of a young police officer who is kidnapped by his wife, who he thinks still loves him.

    This exposed an ecosystem that had been hidden from the sun for over 120,000 years. Imbedded deep in the ice shelf was an object. The object was carrying a deadly virus that killed most of the world's population. A group of strangers, bound by circumstance, embark on an epic adventure to develop a vaccine to save what is left of the human race. In the sequel, Akureyri Gateway, one of the three individuals that is immune from the deadly virus visits a cave in Akureyri, Iceland. This cave holds the key to unlocking the mystery surrounding the origins of the worldwide pandemic. The adventure continues with Biogenic Convergence, the third installment in this series.

    It offers vast amounts of information on the essential component elements of each building. A true classic in the industry.

    While Midas and Cassidy enjoy a small getaway, Sierra and Joshua take the lead on this ghost hunt. A skeletal apparition terrorizes anyone who invades its territory. A black mist tries to smother a terrified client. Phantom mirrors break at Brady Hall and an otherworldly, palpable and paralyzing fear plagues the team. Will they be able to suppress their fear and help the volunteers of this historic Mobile, Alabama landmark? Or will this mean the doors close at Brady Hall forever? If you enjoy southern gothic stories with a modern twist and immersive ghost hunting, you'll love this episode of M.L. Bullock's Gulf Coast Paranormal. Grab a flashlight and your copy of The Spirits of Brady Hall now! Visit M.L. Bullock's website at www.mlbullock.com. Join her Facebook fan page at www.facebook.com/AuthorMLBullock